Fluid Mexican onyx, digitally manipulated prints and statements omitting subjects in favor of actions intertwine in this exhibition featuring three renowned and internationally acclaimed artists – Kirsten Ortwed, Rosemarie Trockel and Lawrence Weiner – each of whom has made their unique contribution to defining what we understand as contemporary art.
Gogo is the second exhibition in the series Valgslægtskaber [Elective Affinities], exploring connections between artists across time, place and media. Den Frie Centre of Contemporary Art has invited sculptor Kirsten Ortwed, who will be exhibiting a wide selection of her works from 1989 to the present day, with a primary focus on sculptures and installations from recent years. Ortwed brings with her German artist Rosemarie Trockel and American artist Lawrence Weiner, both of whom she has known and worked with for decades. Rosemarie Trockel will exhibit new works at the exhibition, including two large photo installations from 2019 and 2021. Lawrence Weiner, who passed away during preparations for the exhibition in December 2021, will be represented at the exhibition with six monumental text “sculptures” made between 1988 and 2012, designed specifically for the angular architecture of Den Frie Centre of Contemporary Art. Together, these works comprise an artistic conversation about the boundary between physics and metaphysics, about the everyday and the obscure.
Kirsten Ortwed is a highly respected sculptor who for decades has played a vital role in shaping Danish and international contemporary art. Ortwed moved back to Denmark in 2020 after living and working abroad for an extended period. From 1982 she lived in Cologne, Germany and was active on the art scene there for many years as one of the few female sculptors. After representing Denmark at the Venice Biennale in 1997, she moved to Pietrasanta in northern Tuscany. From then until today, the great inquisitiveness and impact of Ortwed’s work has expanded the genre of sculpture. Informed by movements such as Minimalism, Conceptual art and Arte Povera, her works embrace industrial, geological and organic materials – always with a special attention to process and transformation.
Ortwed and Trockel have known each other and exhibited together since the 1980s. In 1991, they collaborated on a dual exhibition at Galleri Susanne Ottesen. It was also during that period that Ortwed and Lawrence Weiner met and became friends. In 1999, they created an extensive exhibition at Malmö Konsthall, where text works by Weiner interacted with a sculptural field of aluminium objects on the floor by Ortwed. The kinship between Ortwed, Trockel and Weiner is not one of shared aesthetics. It is first and foremost rooted in a drive to push the boundaries of art.
